


All The Stars Are Dead

by ForrestFox



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bottom Jean Kirstein, Emotional Jean Kirstein, Hurt/Comfort, Jean is kinda a wreck in this, M/M, POV Eren Yeager, Top Eren Yeager, Yoga, and he's buff asf, but Eren's there, so its okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-30
Updated: 2015-11-30
Packaged: 2018-05-04 03:27:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5318702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForrestFox/pseuds/ForrestFox
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You're seriously going to drink a 1940's Bangladesh out of coffee mugs?"</p><p>Eren shrugs, not recognising the problem, "They're clean."</p><p>Jean snorts in his uptight snobby way, but it doesn't aggravate Eren like it used to, it just makes him laugh as the skinny blonde takes the mug with a pinched face. "Thank god the champagne is decent."</p><p>"Anything for you, princess."</p><p>"You have nothing for me, peasant."</p><p>"Um, I have this kick-ass bed." And my dick. Let's have sex</p><p>OR</p><p>In which it takes Eren an awkward morning after, a talk with Reiner and Bertolt, and a drunken conversation with Annie to realise he's absolutely in love with Jean Kirstein.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All The Stars Are Dead

Eren wakes up, and he remembers nothing. 

Alcohol is probably the leading cause of most mistakes in Eren's 23 years of life. It's indirectly yet predominantly why Eren has a tattoo of Connie's name in Japanese script on his left butt cheek (Connie has his on his right), and why Mikasa kicked him out of her house. _She_ claims it's because she's sick of cleaning up vomit, but Eren know's it's because she wanted to move Annie in for easier access to sex.

"I still love you Eren."

"But you love the sounds of Annie's moans more."

"...If you aren't out by tomorrow I'm burning your shit."

It's why the pub down the street has a three-meter restraining order against him and why he was relieved from duty after spending a year in the army (apparently sneaking in alcohol for the entire regiment is frowned upon), which is fine, since's he's much happier with his apprenticeship under Erwin anyway as a construction man. 

It's also why Jean Kirstein is currently in his bed, naked and dribbling a swimming pool on his pillow. 

Fuck.

Last night was a blur of drunken laughter, greasy couches, and stale cheese. The faint smell of burning shoes lingers on his skin, or possibly the dirty t-shirt that's abandoned on the floor, along with a pair of skinny jeans that Eren assumes are Jeans since he himself wouldn't be able to fit a single toe in those things.

Jean's a fucking twig and his legs look like the tree trunks in the Dr. Seuss books (the only books Eren had the patience to read).  

There's also the faint smell of green apples creeping through the robust musk of sex and sweat, which Eren tracks the down to be Jean's hair.

He drags a hand over his face, slowly rising from the bed in a zombie-like way and stumbling into his kitchen, picking up a feasibly clean shirt from the floor. The apartment is small with three rooms only, bathroom, bedroom and the tiny roof patio. It's affordable, and the view is nice. You can see the ocean, and when the sun sets it's butter melting on a horizon. Christa's come round more than once to take photo's for her blog in the time he's lived here. 

Grabbing the orange juice from the counter the drink's straight from the carton (he lives alone so he can do that), trying to purge the taste of cum from his mouth without thinking of where the fuck it came from.

Where it came from is currently fucked out on his bed.

It's around three in the afternoon according to the tv, and Eren deposits himself down on his couch with a protein magazine and a documentary on Squid Sex, narrated David Attenborough. He waits for Jean. 

Jean wakes up predictably with a loud curse. He stumbles out of the bedroom wearing one of Eren's shirts, Jean's all long, skinny legs and little boney torso, so the shirt almost drowns his upper half, falling to one shoulder. He scowls through squinted, makeup smudged eyes at Eren (mascara because Jean's a wannabe), and limps over to the bathroom, shutting himself in without a word. Eren can hear him throwing up through the door.

He never could hold his alcohol down, typical lightweight. 

"Don't puke on my fucking floor," Eren warns, idly flicking the page of his magazine. 

On his way out Jean gives him the finger, tells him his dick is small (it's not, he knows this for a fact) and rams the door closed. As soon as he's alone Eren calls Armin on his cell phone, having to wade through all the shit in his room to find it in the back pocket of the pants he wore last night. Life's not about having a clean room, therefore Eren can't see the reason to constantly cleaning it. 

Armin picks up on the second ring. 

"Finally awake I see. I've called you three times already," Armin says, feigning exasperation. 

Eren squints at the ceiling, "Who the fuck let me go home with Jean last night?"

"Holy Goat, are you serious?"

"Wish I wasn't."

"Did you guys-"

"Yeah..."

"Wow."

"Yeah."

He can hear Armin tapping on his keyboard through the phone, and one of his _too many_ dogs yipping. 

"Are you sure you had sex? Maybe you just fell asleep or-"

"Yeah I'm sure, I know what it feels like after you fuck someone. And plus, Jean acted like a total asshole when he woke up, so I assume he's pissed about having my dick in his ass."

He can hear Armin grimace through the speaker. "Must you talk about sexual intercourse like that? I know you're sexually active but you should really be more considerate of those who prefer not to involve themselves in such activities, let alone hear about it being talked about in such a vulgar manner."

Armin then launches into his reoccurring monologue about Asexuality and behavioral differences of people who are sexually active compared to those who aren't.

Eren rolls his eyes.

"Right, right. You prefer to have an intimate and passionate relationship with knowledge, my bad _Hermione_." Most days Eren doesn't understand how someone can live without sex, but Armin seems content with anatomising and vivisecting dead humans in the basement of a creepy as hell hospital, and Eren decides he doesn't need to understand it if Armin does (like English).  "Damn though, I didn't even know Jean was going to Ymir's last night. I thought he had that yoga whatever thing on."

"It was canceled. He came with Connie and Sasha in Connie's cousin's car, which Connie crashed into Ymir's garage trying to do those burnouts that are in the 'furiously fast' movies."

"Fast and Furious," he corrects absently. Armin ignores him. 

"He was driving around saying, continuously and without fault, ' _Hie thee hither, that I may pour my spirits in thine ear, and chastise with the valor of my tongue_ ', from the play Macbeth?  He quotes William Shakespeare when he's drunk, isn't that visible, and afterward, he crashed he was saying _'Mercy, but murders, pardoning those that kill,_ ' to Ymir's sink for a good three hours. I don't think the sink thought much of W. Shakespeare."

"Is he okay?"

"He's fine, the car's dented and the garage no longer has a door that can close but... Ymir was too drunk at the time to get too angry. Christa told him off though and took his key's off him. It's a good thing that Jean went home with you, otherwise, he would've been stuck top and tailing with Connie and Sash, and you know what they're like in the morning when all you want to do is sleep. Jean would've hated that, he like's his sleep," Jean's known for being a lazy fuck, "And at least he went home with someone he knew."

"And now i've probably got an STD."

"If anything it's more probable that _Jean_ contracted something," Armin sniffs indignantly.  Which isn't true, because Eren's totally clean and healthy. The last time he had sex was over a month ago, where he dated a girl for a bit but broke off because they couldn't handle each other's lifestyles. Eren may be on a low income as an apprentice, but he's not going to subject his body to a lack of nutrition and fast food as a substitute. He'd rather spend money on meat than two-minute noodles. He didn't get this much muscle when he finally hit puberty just to lose it all to fat. 

Plus, Jean's the one who's sleeping around. Eren's seen photo's on Facebook (late at night when he stalks all his friends because none of them will respond to his text's) where there's some guy with his arm around Jean's waist and a drink in hand, where Jean looks like he might just be drunk enough to let the guy fuck him. A glassy smirk and watery laugh is not consent people. 

And anyway, these guys are just the ones caught in photos, who knows how many there were that didn't have a camera around to catch them. 

"I thought you said that you weren't going to let me drive if I got too drunk last night?"

"I didn't allow you to drive, against almost everyone's wishes, besides Ymir, you walked back."

"Walked!"

"Trust me, I was surprised too. But Ymir kicked you out after your obnoxious attempt to get Jean to blow you on her grandmothers' couch, and then you were wandering around for half an hour trying to remember where you parked before you dragged Jean away with you. Mikasa was in a state of irritation for the rest of the night. As it was Annie had to restrain her from going after you."

"I wish she hadn't-"

"Annie used some... unorthodox methods. She may be withdrawn, but is not a quiet person when involved in certain proceedings."

"-I could've used a cockblock."

Armin sighs, "Stop being so dramatic. Jean's a convivial person when he's not subjected to you and you're devious personality."

"Devious?"

"And he's not displeasing to the eye, might i add."

"You mightn't."

"You're drawn to 'prissy twinks' as you shrewdly call them, which is Jean by definition. And he's attractive, his facial features are symmetrical and his teeth are exemplary. Not to mention the unblemished mien of his skin. He may be a little too skinny, by that's most likely due to the ectomorphic attributes of his body and his inability to obtain a substantial amount of weight to-"

Eren's zoned out, a common occurrence when speaking with Armin (Armin has a large vocabulary, but Eren's learning... slowly), and since the subject isn't anything important or interesting (it's about Jean) it's easy to ignore. 

Astonishingly, there's not a trace of guilt or regret from sleeping with Jean. There's disgust sure, Jean is Jean after all. He's snotty, rude, mouthy, on his period 24/7, emotional, catty, has a dumb haircut and a dumb dress sense;

_"Horse-face you look like a ponce with that scarf."_

_"Shut up Jaeger, at least i'm wearing pants."_

_"You mean_ tights _."_

_"You're wearing board shorts for fuck's sake!"_

_"So?"_

_"This is_  prom! _"_

Jean also has a habit of never finishing a meal, and always posting selfies of himself and his latest Starbucks fetish (it's white hot chocolate at the moment). He also has his ears pierced and as of last night Eren's found that Jean also has his tongue pierced, the one thing he remembers because he was so surprised to find it, and then later remembers obsessing over it when Jean had Eren's cock in his mouth and he was sucking on it, the feel of the little metal stud was... Eren vehemently shakes his head.

Jean's almost the opposite of Eren. He's stubborn and annoying and stupid and Eren's totally none of those things. None of them. Also, Jean's a writer (A shitty writer of smutty romance novels according to Armin, who's just about read everything on the planet) and Eren's a self-diagnosed dyslexic, so he hasn't read a book since he was in high school. 

"-of course this situation was bound to occur. It's no secret that there has always been a substantial amount of acidity, both positive and negative, between the two of you. The probability is rather high if I do say so myself and-"

Eren coughs, " _Woah, Woah_ , _Woah_ , Professor, iterate please?"

"Nice word."

"Armin!"

"I just said you and Jean."

"Yeah? Me and Jean what?"

"You and Jean- Oh! I have to go, the hospital just paged and Arnold's finally passed away. Oh, this is exciting! We haven't been able to retrieve any samples of his disease that would qualify for a substantial investigation of the-"

Eren hangs up.

  

* * *

  

There's a gym not far from where Eren's apartment is, and Reiner and Bertolt's bakery is just down the street, so frequently (every day or so) the three of them would meet at the gym and work out together. Since Reiner's a competitive weightlifter and Bertolt think's exercise is calming for the physical soul. Eren's all about muscle building since his job kinda requires it, they're all largely enthusiastic about gym time. Erwin always gives him the heavy lifting jobs because he's greener than grass 

ERB (said how it sounds) is what they call themselves, a club name of sorts. They've even made a group chat on Facebook between them, alongside the major group chat consisting of everyone, which is constantly being renamed. The present name is SASHA!LOVES!FOOD but it could possibly have been changed to anything, ranging from _Donnie Darko Is Annie's Spirit Animal_ to simply _FACE_. 

It's brought the three of them closer, in a way that Eren appreciates greatly. He's never had friends that were real manly men like them (even if Bertolt decorates cupcakes as a pastime and Reiner has a subscription to Kitten Klub Monthly). They can rough and tumble and talk about dick sizes and who they'd fuck when they watch the Olympic Men's Gymnastics that Reiner religiously records. Things he can't do with Mikasa or Armin. 

Eren relishes his time spent with them. Until they go and get all cocky on him like a couple of clucky hens.

"My, my... if it isn't Eren Jaeger, biggest manwhore in town. Tell me, Charlie Sheen, how does one manage to bed a twink as elite and pretentious as the man Kristein? Me and Bertie are tryna get him to agree to a threesome. "

"It would be rather interesting to see if he's still ticklish," Bertolt murmurs, "He used to be ticklish when we were kids."

"Would it happen to be your drunken inner charm that swept him off his feet? Or the noble yet savage way you staked your claim? You were rather rough with him at Ymir's, dragging him around the bonfire like a chew toy. I'm surprised he let you, i was waiting for him to neuter your balls into the ground. It seems Jean's a real sucker for dominant men like yourself, being the prudish little princess that he is, i bet he'd-"

Even as Eren tackles him playfully onto the padded gym ground and wrestles him into a head lock, Reiner looks like he's having the time of his life. "It was easy," he says, "you just have to be as hung as i am. Whoops, guess you're out of the race Reiner, never stood a chance."

"You're right. I could never have competed with the chemistry between you two."

"He called me fuckface when he left."

Reiner kisses the tips of his fingers, "Pure romance."

The brunette rolls his eyes and releases his friend, but not before squirting a half bottle of water on the blondes face as an extraction of revenge. Bertolt eyes the security camera in the corner and calls them childish as they start stretching, before making their way over to the treadmills as a warm up. The gym is mostly empty, since it's a Tuesday, and who honestly goes to the gym at 9am on a Tuesday?

"Seriously though," Bertolt asks's in his quietly deep voice, "what was it like?"

"What was _what_ like?" Eren asks. 

Reiner hit's him over the head, "Fucking Kristein! Must've been awkward, i'd imagine someone like him would be awkward. Until you get into it, then i bet he's as noisy as a flute. He's mouthy, that one, so he'd probably do a decent blowie as well."

Eren snorts, remembering briefly the feel of his hand in Jean's cropped hair and a sucking sensation on his dick to accompany it (Jean's tongue piercing rubbing agains his foreskin is driving him mad), and tries to dislodge it with a shake of his head. "Ew, he's a fucking bottle blonde. And everyone know's bottle blondes are try-hard dicks. I ain't touching that train wreck with a ten foot pole." 

"He's got a rather nice behind, very pert," Bert comments offhandedly. 

"Well, yeah," the blonde continues, speeding into a sprint, "He does yoga, and _everyone_ know's that people who are into all that physical and internal healing shit are fit as fuck. _And_ he's got some leg's on him, he's a bloody tease in those skinny jeans. Flexible too, i've seen him do the splits before when Christa was showing us her gymnastics routine. Which reminds me, Bertolt and I recorded the Men and Women's Olympic Gymnastics if you want us to burn it to a disk for ya? The Men's is rather... interesting, don't you thing Bertie?" 

At Riner's eyebrow wiggle Bertolt throws a towel in his face and moves over to the bench press, Eren automatically going behind him to spot. Eren alway's catch's Bertolt's, and Bertolt catches Eren's, and then the two of them work together to spot Reiner since he lifts ridiculously heavy amounts. 

"I can't even remember. I was way off my face mate, like, seriously hammered. Didn't wake up till three, although that could have been due to the fact that we walked all the way from Ymir's to home."

Both of the bakery boy's laugh, "Yeah, i heard about that. Far way to walk, but suppose you two were too drunk to remember."

"Thank god for that, no doubt Jean would've pissed and moaned the entire way. Fucking Prima-donna."

Bertolt sits up to wipe his face when he finishes a set of twenty five, when he swaps with Eren he gives Riner a kiss on the cheek in passing, and Eren's stomach does it's customary twinge. The only downside to hanging out with Bertolt and Reiner is that not matter what you're always third wheeling. They don't do it intentionally, their type of love is something even gods envy. 

It serves as a solid reminder at how single Eren is. Maybe he should get a dog for companionship, if his land lord will let him have animals on the property. Probably not, and he doesn't want to end up like Armin who has two Pomeranians, a Corgi and a horrendous looking Chihuahua. A steadily growing family now that Armin's showing him pictures of a Maltese on his phone. 

"Did you hear Connie crashed his car?"

"I thought that was his cousins car? That's what Armin told me."

"Probably was. It happened after Ymir kicked you and Jean out for PDA. She said if you two were girls she would've let you stay, but, ya know, penis's personally offend her so... But hey, at least you didn't have to deal with Thing 1 and Thing 2 in the morning." 

Eren laughs, and speaking of Thing 1; his phone buzzes, as does Reiner and Bertolt's. 

On; _BITCHES##FARTS_

Connie; _Any1 keen 4 a party @ som rando's hwse? Crsta saidd she wil soba drive us all there n bck in Ymrs Pdofile van. Meet @ Ymrs @ 20:20. BYOD assholes._

_Connie has changed the group name to PARTY@RANDOM_

Eren can see Reiner's eyebrows bunched into a line of confusion and Bertolt's lips moving to sound of the words. Connie, even with auto correct, is still stuck in 2009 when shit like this was cool, but Eren can't judge, he still uses caps lock for everything.

_SURE I AM COMING WILL ANYOONE B WILLING TO PICK ME UP MY CAR IS STILL AT YMIRS HOUGSE_

_*HOUSE_

Mikasa: _Your car is at my place. I drove it home._

_KWL  WILL COME GET IT AFTA GYM TIME OK. DO U HAVE KEYS?_

Mikasa: D _o you think i drove it without the keys Eren?_

Connie: _Lawd, wat foools thse mortls b_

_Sasha has changed the group name to ASSPARTY2015_

 

* * *

 

"You should talk to him. Clear your conscious, or whatever that's had you staring creepily at him all night." 

Eren stares at his sister's girlfriend incredulously, having to bend his neck intensely to actually look at her instead of the top of her head. Annie's sipping on a very expensive looking bottle of wine even though she arrived empty handed (Eren has no idea where she get's them from, but she always has them). She's staring steadily over the yard at Jean, who's leaning against a wall, talking to some incredibly pretty indian girl.

"I'm not staring _creepily_ at him. I'm not- you don't think he's noticed do you?"

Annie shrugs, "No."

"He's probably been too focused on avoiding you to be noticing your creepy stares. Or maybe he _has_ noticed and that's the reason he's avoiding you. This feels like a trick question." 

Sasha's suddenly sprung up behind them like a fucking real live jack-in-the-box on crack, talking a mile a minute and Eren feels like asking who let her eat candy and drink booze at the same time. It's an unspoken rule that one does not let the Brouse girl ingest any sugary sweet whilst under the influence of alcohol. Because _shit_ get's crazy, and _shit_ get's uncontrollable and rebellious, and _shit_ often get's them kicked out of places or gives them a bad rep. 

"I'm not staring _creepily_ , just maybe a little-"

"Weirdly. Curiously. Obsessively. Disturbingly. Unusual. Abnormal. Scary. Dominating. Fanatical. Neurotic. Idiosyncratic. Anomalous-"

Eren growls. "Alright. Thank you Queen of Synonyms. Very helpful."

Annie looks over at her, "How is _Idiosyncratic_ in your vocabulary?"

Sasha shrugs dramatically, "I had a teacher who taught me the difference between idiot and idiom, and then started talking about all the words that start with _idio_ , like idiomatic, idiotype, idiopathy, idiographic, idiolect. Did you know there's such a thing as an idiophone? It's something that vibrates to make a sound then it's shaken or struck, like a bell or a rattle or a, what are those things on the drums that go _pshhhh_? Hold on, where's Mikasa, she plays drums, she'll know- Hey, where are you  _Buddy Rich_!"

The brown haired girl whizzes into the crowd, lost within seconds, since suddenly there seems to be a whole lot of people outside. Eren refocuses his attention.

There's suddenly a lot more people around Jean too, one guy with a gross pervert moustache is especially looking at him, at his ass, but Jean's glaring at _Eren_ with black eyes, like _he's_ done something appallingly awful. He shoots him what he hopes is a sincere and attractive smile however it goes largely unappreciated when Jean bares his teeth and gives him the finger.

_Woah there Punk Rock, the music's casual, there's no reason to go stage diving._

Eren turns away to pout into his half empty cup. He doesn't feel like drinking, but if Jean continues to blacklist him then he's all for becoming ragingly drunk and unconscious. This is bullshit, he has no idea what he's done to the prick. It's the first time they've seen each other all week and Eren hasn't even talked to him, hasn't even _tried_ , so there's no way it could have been something he said. And he's not even going to _try_ and trace anything back to _that night_... his sleuthing skills are null. Where's Armin with a magnifying glass when you need him? 

He was way too fucked up and hungover to even remember what he said anyway, let alone what he said that might have _offended Jean_. In fact, if it wasn't for everyone laughing at him, Jean glaring at him, and the general _offness_ he feels inside, it would be easy to think it never happened. 

"You're a fucking pussy, you know that?"

Annie's still here. Standing beside him and smirking her own private amusement at the cost of Eren's potential love life. "Oh yeah? How much have you had to drink tonight?"

"I'm fine." She's wobbling, looking slightly lost in her blank faced Annie way. You wouldn't be able to tell unless you were part of the 'Epileptic Eleven' (They took a trip to Easter Island together where Sasha's father works, and were meant to get 'Explorer Eleven' printed on t-shirts so people knew they were together, but then Sasha on the phone fucked it up so they ended up walking around with Epileptic on their backs. Bertolt, who actually does have Epilepsy, thought it was great, and everyone kept giving them these looks like, 'it's so sweet you're living life despite your illness'. Eren and Connie played it up by convulsing on the ground every four minutes and saying rather dramatically _Everything's a Trigger_!).

Ever since Annie's become Mikasa's, Mikasa has switched her overprotective possessiveness from Eren to her.

Annie doesn't seem to mind it, unlike Eren who hated it so much he would do stupid shit just to fuck with his sister, but Annie never fails to blush whenever Mikasa calls her to ask her where she is and if she's okay, or be standing over her like a fucking bodyguard. In fact, if Eren didn't know any better, he'd say Annie got off on it, being treated like a princess made of glass. Everyone else just assumes Annie can take care of herself, or doesn't want anybody intruding in her problems.

Even though he got kicked out of his house, he's glad they'd found each other. But now, if anything happens to Dunk Annie on Eren's watch, he's going to have to answer to Mikasa.  "Do you want me to find Mika for you?"

She hesitates, then shakes her head. " _Nein_. Ask me a question."

Eren rolls his eyes. "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?"

"The rooster," she says without missing a beat, "See, not drunk." She pauses, contemplative and staring at Eren as Eren stares from her to the guy molesting Jean. "I didn't know you liked Jean."

Eren frankly didn't know that he like'd Jean either, until Reiner and Bertolt started talking about Legs, and Asses and Threesomes, and now that he thinks about it, yeah, they're not wrong. 

And that sort of just... _highlighted (?)_ some of Jeans more finer aspects. He's still a prissy piece of shit, but his ass _is_ rather pert. And his legs are fantastically long, and how come Eren was so drunk that he couldn't enjoy and appreciate any of that when he banged Jean the first time? 

If he want's to see if Jean's really _all that_ then he's going to have to go in for round two, and Eren's not sure if Jean will be very enthusiastic about a round two. It's more of a one time thing, and now it's over and Eren can't even fucking remember it. Goddamn you Alcohol. 

"Eren, he's going round the back of the house, now's your chance to go talk to him alone."

Annie references the direction where Jean disappears off into the darkness with her wine bottle, stumbling a little. She's a lot drunker than she seems, and before he chases Jean he hauls her off to sit with Connie on a fallen log. "Look after her."

_"Doubt though the stars are fire; Doubt that the sun doth move; Doubt truth to be a liar; But never doubt i love."_

"Whatever _William_ , so long's you don't get her scratched, Mikasa won't fuck with you."

He catches Jean out on a secluded balcony, the flare of a lighter lighting up his pointy face. Jean only smokes when he's stressed, Eren know's this for a fact because he gave him shit about it whenever he saw it, until he realised recently that every time Jean had a cigarette clutched in his bone white hand it would be for a fair reason. School exams, the first time a publishing company rejected his work, Marco's funeral...

His presence is revealed when he steps on a creaky floor board, and Jean scowls up at him. Eren's taken aback slightly by the level of disgust and anger he see's in those golden eyes, not at all the usual bitter annoyance. He's never been looked at with this much hate in his life, not directly, not even when he accidentally set fire to one of the dead bodies Armin was fawning over when it was bring your kid to work day (Armin couldn't bring his dogs, so he brought Eren).

Jean doesn't speak, so Eren does. "Hey."

The skinny man rolls his eyes and turns away from him, taking a long inhale of the cigarette and looking out at the darkness of the street. It's late, just after 1:00 since the last glance at a cellphone, so the houses are dark and empty, and the streetlights are soldiers at attention. 

Eren opens his mouth, but Jean speaks. "I'm not in the mood to talk right now. Not to you."

"What? But i didn't do-"

The slender man spins on him, smoke brokenly streaming from his mouth as he hisses, "If you fucking say you didn't do anything then i will fucking strangle you. And stop staring at me. It's creepy and it's... fucking putting people off. I had one girl ask me if we were dating, or fighting, because she noticed you were eye fucking me the whole time she was chatting to me. Stop... just fuck off."

He looks serious, and Eren's not sure where to move on from here, so he coughs awkwardly into his hand and scuffs his shoe. 

"I just came here to talk about the other night, clear the conscience, yeah?" 

"Why?"

Eren shrugs, "I, um, i think we just need to talk."

He waits until Jean takes a deep breath, nodding his head before sitting down on the balcony steps. Jean sits too, but far enough from Eren that if anyone was looking at them they wouldn't think they were together in a conversation. 

"Whatever, i don't have all night. I have a class to teach tomorrow night."

"You teach?" It's off track. Jean glares. "Anyway, um... about the other night."

"You don't remember a thing." It's a statement, not a question. Eren shakes his head ruefully and Jean snorts. "Fucking typical..." Eren wonders what makes it typical, but doesn't quite want to know the answer. "Do you want me to tell you what happened?"

"Please?"

Jean taps his foot, like he might refuse even though it was _his_ suggestion, and Eren's hoping that Jean's not enough of an asshole to actually say _no_. 

"Fine." He huffs, like this whole thing is an ordeal now. "You were drinking. _A lot_. As usual... And so was i, but not... Anyway, it was when everyone was around the bonfire, they had chucked Ymir's sneakers into it and were seeing whoever could get them out the fastest without them burning and falling to pieces." He waves his cigarette around ominously, "...whoever did would earn a kiss from Christa, or something. I dunno, something stupid. And you kept on grabbing my ass the whole night and pointing at my shirt, which you still have by the way."

One of Eren's pillows is currently wearing it in a totally not weird way, "And you still have mine."

Jean puts the cigarette to his mouth, "I burnt it. I didn't have anything shitty in my house to substitute as paper so i used your shitty shirt."

Eren can't remember what shirt it was, but he's still angry. "Why didn't you just use printer paper? You didn't have to-"

"I didn't want to get up, and my rubbish bin is right next to the fireplace so..." He shrugs and blows smoke from his mouth, "It wasn't even a nice shirt. It had a hole in it."

Most of Eren's shirts have holes in them. 

Jean pauses when an anonymous couple come stumbling onto the balcony,  then off down the road, giggling and pawing at each other until they're swallowed by the street. Both men watch them go, silent and listening to the bass of the song blaring through the stereo, something upbeat and pop and contrasting with the tense silence between them.

"And then, you dragged me onto the couch, and we started making out, and you were terrible at it but i put up with it of course, because you looked stupid by yourself and..." A far away, absent look appears on Jean's face for a mere second, before it flees, "And then we went to yours. And that's all."

Eren splutters, "That's all you remember?"

The dirty look he receives is almost as terrifying as Annie's resting bitch face. "Well, what do you remember Robert??"

"Robert?"

"Robert Downy Jr. He was an alcoholic and a drug addict. You two would get along nicely if he wasn't already clean. Oh well, i guess it gives you something to aspire to."

"I'm not a..." He squints and scratches his head, "Um, nothing really... i think you sucked my dick?"

Jean starts coughing on his cigarette in bouts of smoke, but flinches away when Eren tries to pat him on the back. Jean's not wearing very many cloths, he notices, just skinny jeans (does he wear anything else?) and a very flimsy singlet, and he can see the vertebrae of his spinal chord through the thin shirt. He'd never say it to his face, because lord know's Jean's self conscious enough, but the boy really is a spindly bag of bones. 

Jean looks at Eren with cough-teary eyes, the same (if not more) level of disgust and anger is back, and Jean wipes his eyes before standing up to leave. Eren catches his boney wrist, causing him to drop is cigarette. "Wait-"

"Let go!" He yanks his hand away, looking briefly in at his eyes before storming back round where the party is, and Eren's left sitting alone on the second balcony step.

He doesn't get his second chance with Jean that night. And Jean isn't with them on the van ride home. 

 

* * *

  

"Do you know who Jean went home with the other night?"

Armin looks up from where he's mother-henning over his dogs. He brought all of them with him, look absolutely ridiculous walking around with that many dogs spazzing out on the end of their leashes. 

"No. He wasn't in the Pedo van with us."

"I think he's angry at me. Like, really pissed... aggrieved."

"Well, did you do anything to him? Like, did you tear his scarf or insult his mascara? You know he loathes when you do that."

Eren shake's his head. "That's the thing, i can't remember if i did or not. I was too out of it to know what was even going on!"

Armin looks disappointed. "Maybe he regrets getting involved with you at all." He picks at a napkin, trying to pretend like what he just said wasn't at all offensive or rude. 

"But there's nothing to regret, i'm fucking gorgeous, i mean look at me."

Armin snickers, "I try not to, you're an unpalatable sight on a good day."

"Jean said i looked stupid by myself. He said that i was a bad kisser."

"Well, that's a lie. When i kissed you, you were impeccable. Or at least of adequate technique." Eren had made out with Armin only once, because Armin wanted to know what it was like. It wasn't at all intimate or sexual, because Armin was coming from a purely scientific angle, and still couldn't understand the appeal of it even afterwards. He'd apparently kissed a few others before to further his evaluation, but Eren was his last. "You do that interesting tongue and teeth thing too."

"Armin, you were put off  _sex_ after you kissed me. You were put off  _humans in general_."

The blonde waves a dismissive hand and feeds the ugly chihuahua thing in his lap a chip. "Oh, do you like chips Creamspice?" 

A waitress comes and puts two smoothies in front them, a pineapple and carrot one for Armin because he's a freak like that, and a banana and apple one for Eren. The poor thing had to doge the army of small dogs that is Armin's children, the Corgi managing to almost pee on the girls foot. "Muffinpie! No, we don't pee on other people."

"Yeah Muffin-Shit, just pee on Armin, he get's off on it."

Armin kicks him in the shin and one of the little bastards bite his jandal. Eren's only in his boardshorts and jandals, having gone out for a swim in the ocean before meeting up with Armin. As a hobby, Eren's a qualified life guard, and mostly does Thursday, Wednesday and Monday watches, when everything's quiet and all the little children that you have to really keep an eye on are at school. 

It's Sunday, he wasn't on duty but he still went for a swim since it's ridiculously hot. Even Armin's in shorts and a tee, showing off those vampiric looking arms and legs. Eren was afraid he'd sparkle and get attacked by birds. 

However it's getting later in the afternoon now, and the sun's starting to go pink with setting nostalgia, and Eren can tell already that it's going to be a beautiful sunset. 

"Christa might come round to mine to take photos of the sunset, if she's not already down here on the beach." 

"Hmmm... I'm thinking i might get this little Applecake, she's just new in the shelter and they're giving her away free because she has Amblyopia."

Armin shows him a picture on his phone (the latest piece of technology a rich guy like Armin can buy, in fact Jean probably has the same) of him holding a cross eyed little white Maltese. He's touched it, he's got a photo of him holding it, which mean's it's basically bought. The amount of money that Armin spends on his pets is ridiculous. He'd probably be a multi millionaire if he didn't pay for him and all his dogs to fly first class to England for stupid reasons like pet shows.

He didn't even help boost Eren up to first class, Eren had to fly coach even if he didn't want to go to the dog show. 

"Boy or girl."

"Girl, i've been using female pronouns."

"I'm sensing a pattern here," Eren says, gesturing to the other dogs milling around their feet and twisting themselves up on their leashes. They're gonna be a bitch to untangle.

Suddenly they all start barking at once and rushing over to the left, nearly dragging the whole dining set up with them, Eren stops mid curse when he see's who they're barking at.

It's Jean. 

It's Jean in tight yoga pants and a loose long sleeve shirt that's rolled at the elbows and showing off a very, _very_ lick-able set of collarbones. Eren's dick suddenly want's to introduce (or reacquaint) itself with Jean, and Eren bites his tongue and crosses his legs. He tastes blood. 

It would seem that it doesn't matter how much time Eren spends not thinking about Jean, not being around him, Jean will still put dirty thoughts into his head even when it's clear he's pissed off at him. _'Well, Jean, if you don't want me to think about sticking my dick in your ass every time you're near then maybe you should wear a paper bag over your head and your whole goddam body!'_

Still probably wouldn't help. Jean would be fuckable in a paper bag.

Armin smiles down at him as he restrains his dogs, while Jean's on his knee's patting them. One way to win Armin's favour over is to indulge his monstrous children, and whatever direction this conversation takes Eren know's he's going to be the odd one out.

"Armin, you never told me you had such adorable dogs? What breeds are they? What are their names?"

The urge to face palm is great.

Armin spends the next twenty minutes talking non-stop about his dogs, about Gypsieplum and Littlesweet and names that one would find belong to a _My Little Pony_. Jean spends it either interested or pretending to be interested, and Eren spends it trying to get glimpses of Jean's ass in yoga pants. 

"So," Armin starts, after giving a lecture about the proper way to cut a dogs toenails, "are you here long? Would you like to join us?"

Jean gives a brief but noticeable glance at Eren, "I'm actually the instructor of a yoga class here." He gestures to the purple yoga matt tucked under his arm. "I have classes most nights on the beach, it's kind of a hobby, and it get's me out of the house, other wise i'm just stretching alone."

"How, sweet, isn't that sweet Eren?"

"Sweet, yeah... Like grass."

The urge to face palm is almost unbearable now, and Armin's looking at him like he's one of his dogs who just sniffed his own butt. Jean, thankfully, laughs. 

"Intelligent as always Jaeger." 

Eren tries not to grin too freakishly. The insult is good. It's hopeful. At least they're on speaking terms, instead of death glares and ignorance. Eren can work with this, he can still turn this drunken one night stand into something that could be something _more_ than a drunken one night stand. He's hopeful and incredibly stupid and determined, and so is Jean, so things could possibly work out. 

Or maybe Eren's reading way too much into things. 

The skinny man didn't even want to talk to him a few days ago. 

Jean checks his phone (it is the same money gloating phone that Armin has) and grimaces, "Hey, i've got to go and set up. Good to see you guys, i feel like i never see anyone anymore. I'm always so busy, but um, text me and we can catch up for dinner or something?"

Even though the invitation wasn't extended to him, Eren nod's anyway and hungrily, if somewhat greedily, watches Jean's ass as he walks away, wishing he could take a photo of Jean in yoga pants to make as his screen saver. 

When he turns around Armin's eyebrows have almost vanished into his hairline. Eren blushes, "What?"

"You really are into him."

Eren is sure his face is remnant of a beetroot right now, but he nods. 

Armin hums.

 

* * *

  

Wednesday mornings are reserved for Morning Jogging, where Eren runs to Mikasa and Annie's house, take's a dump in their toilet, steals the fruit yogurt in their fridge and get's kicked out by Annie, since Wednesday mornings are the only mornings that Annie has off all week. 

He found out Annie was a vet when he brought a dying alley cat into their home from his way back from the gym one day, and Annie was at the house with Mikasa, and she fixed it, like one would fix a broken curtain rail. Now the thing lingers round their house like a bad cold. But she's an emergency Veterinarian, meaning that she's on call every day except for Wednesday morning. 

However, Morning Jogging was Mikasa and Eren's thing since before Annie, and even before Armin moved out, so whatever morning sex they might have it's interrupted by Eren using their toilet without flushing and leaving empty yogurt containers in their sink. 

Mikasa is a professional boxer, somewhat of a budding celebrity if anyone manages to take a photo of her outside the arena, she goes by the name of Humanities Strongest, adopted form their old boxing instructor Levi who is now her full time coach. 

Anyway, he picks Mikasa up and they jog on the walkway along the waterfront. 

"Sasha got into that prestigious international chef school she applied for. Youngest woman to be accepted."

"You know she knows the word idiosyncratic?"

"She was giving me an _Armin-equivalent_ lecture on why music is a window to the soul a couple of nights ago. Very deep," she gasps, leaping over a fallen umbrella. How did that even get on the walkway?

"She's actually _smart_. And so is Connie. Would you believe the two of them learnt how to speak Russian in two months. And Connie can recite Hamlet word for word. He quotes Shakespeare sometimes, mostly when he's drunk."

Mikasa smiles. " However, he did get your name tattooed on his ass."

"And it looks fucking good ther-"

"Been talking to Jean lately?"

"Not exactly..." But Eren's been stalking hm on every social media site he could find Jean on. He even made an Instagram account (LickMyTitanBalls69), so he could see all of Jean's photo's of his shitty cafe food and piercings that are suddenly the hottest thing Eren's ever seen. Two little silver hoops right up on cartridge of each ear, and one normal stud in the left lobe.

But Facebook has revealed that Jean went home alone the night Eren talked to him and not with  _peverted moustache_ , thank god. Eren's not sure how he feels about Jean going home with anyone other than the people in the Epileptic Eleven.   

There was a picture of him with his cat Nana (it took Eren a while to figure out that Jean mean his cat when he said, 'Hanging with Nana tonight, she can keep me company in bed'), looking absolutely beautiful and hungover, and hickey free from what Eren could see. The caption read; Another night spent getting drunk, and another morning spent recovering alone with Nana Cat. 

Surly Jean's cat isn't at other peoples houses. Surely having the cat in the photo means he's at his house. Alone. 

"He's going round to Armin's this Friday. D'you know he teaches a yoga class?"

"Mmm, that's nice. Too bad you suck at stretching."

"I do not!"

"You can touch your toes and that's it."

 

  

* * *

 

 

When Eren answers the door, he says unintentionally, "Hey baby."

From there dinner is terrible. 

Jean arrives, see's Eren standing there with a smile and in his good shirt, one with no holes, and almost looks like he's going to run away. He goes out for a smoke break at least three times, all of which after Eren's said something seemingly nerve wracking that has to be calmed with nicotine. 

Armin tires very hard to salvage the tense dinner, but Jean flat out refuses to acknowledge Eren, who at this point is drinking wine like it's water, and everything just seems to escalate into a physical fighting match, where Eren punches a cheek and Jean claws a hand into his face.

Jean leaves. Armin looks murderous. Eren's drunk and making mistakes. And the dogs are on the table eating whats left of the barely touched dinner.

Apparently Eren _was_ reading into things.

 

 

* * *

 

 

His cheek heals up in a few days, but Reiner still gives him shit for it afterwards.

He stalks Jean now, not just online but in the real world. He feels like a stalker (he is one), because he's now following Jean around and taking pictures of him, of his butt in Yoga class whilst he does the downward dog. However, he always gets a hard-on halfway through his stalking and has to go home to sort himself out. 

Being the bigger man is something Eren's not used to, but he does show up on Jean's door step with some flowers and an apology a few weeks after the horrid dinner event. A door was shut in his face as soon as Jean saw who it was, and Eren went back to stalking. 

He also apologised to Armin, who wasn't bothered about it at all.

 

 

* * *

 

 

He joins Jean's yoga class, first by hanging around the back of the group and trying to blend into the small crowd of twenty 40-year-old women, then by actually getting involved and making considerable eye contact with Jean, but not _creepy_. On Sunday he bought himself a yoga matt, did some more stalking, got distracted by videos of dogs saving lives, and ate a seaweed muffin.

He wonders briefly how long it take's Jean to notice that he has an extra attendant. Apparently not very. Jean sees him, glares at him surprised, and then ignores him. 

Attending Jean's yoga class turns out to be both positive and negative. Positive, because Eren get's to watch Jean extort himself into incredible poses, revealing a slip of skin here when he goes into a 'backwards bridge', and showing a positively hedonistic curve of spine when he forms 'hunched cat'. Eren's sporting an awkward boner throughout the entire thing, and all the 40 year old women who take the class keep winking at him. 

"-and when you hold that pose, you should feel the weight of you're spine drift into you're shoulders, and if you relax and take a deep breath then-"

Eren's spine can't bend like that. 

"Take deep breaths, from the core of your stomach, not your lungs. 1... 2... 3... Remember to relax-"

Most of the time Eren's too worried to relax, too worried he's going to pull a muscle or jizz in his pants.

"Okay, now if you can, raise your right foot until it's behind your head, as such, and place both hands on the floor, pushing upwards into-"

Eren sits some of these poses out, and just watches the way Jean's movements are so fluid and crisp, compared to everyone else in the class, especially himself. However, Eren doesn't think that Jean could do a lot of he stuff that he can do in the gym. He bet's he hasn't got the endurance Eren has, nor the strength, to lift what would typically be called 'heavy' weights like they were ice-cream cones.

Jean makes eye contact with him as he's walking around the class to correct people, and Eren hurriedly moves into the position of the lady next to him. 

The blonde pauses beside him, speeding Eren's heart up to an unnecessarily high number (1000mph+). Relax, yeah right.

"Goddamn it Jaeger, how are you honestly this useless. It's a simple pose, stop tensing your shoulders. And- here, move you're foot here," he guides Eren's foot across his matt and pushes down, "You feel that?"

Eren nods. It burns.

"Good. And shoulders, i said stop tensing them. Fucking dipshit." He moves closer into Eren's space, boney hands kneading into the space between Eren's shoulder blades.

He's so close that he can smell Jean's shampoo. Green apples were never this erotic until they were used for Jean's shampoo.

"Just relax."

Eren stare's at Jean, and when Jean looks up he can see the pretty gold of his irises. He can see something soft in them, and something sharp, like contrasting lights. How is it that Eren's never noticed how pretty Jean is? 

How is it they've never fucked until now? 

How come all these years they've been fighting the chemistry the have instead of embracing it?

"Excuse me? Mr Kirschstein?" The 40 yr old mother of three coughs shrewdly beside them, giving Eren the stink eye since he's causing the distraction. She taps her Oprah Winfrey Watch, "We've only got three minutes left i get to go home and watch Downtown Abbey. As entertaining as watching you two fall in love is, Edith is going to be getting proposed to and i am _not_ going to miss that."

Have they really been staring into each others eyes all this time?

Jean's blush when he pulls away make's Eren smile, and when he starts stuttering apologies to his other pupils, who are looking rather lovesick and flustered, the smile turns into a smirk. 

"If you're sticking around you need to pay a fee of $10 per class," Jean tells him when the class has dispersed and it's just two of them. Eren often lingers around until Jean goes home, afraid that someone is equally as turned on as he is by Jean's yoga pants and doesn't ask for permission when he grabs at it. 

"Um... Yeah, okay." Of course he would have to pay to spend time with Jean. Jean seems to be okay with him now though, not at all acting vexed or snobbish. In fact, he's actually smiling at Eren, like he did when he was talking to Armin at the cafe. Eren has no clue what happened at dinner, but he heard that Jean invited Armin around to his place for an apology make up brunch, of which Armin won't tell him about at all. 

"Are you enjoying yourself? The sessions- uh, yoga sessions? I know that i'm probably not a very good teacher, but sometimes it's awkward to tell a grown person that they're doing something wrong so..."

Eren gives him a reassuring smile, "Nah, you're doing great."

"Thanks."

"It's more relaxing than i thought it would be."

"Mmm. It clears the conscience."

Eren side eyes him.

Somewhere along the horizon the sun has set, so it's dark along the beach, and windy. Eren can taste the slat from the spray of the wind whipping the waves. As they walk along the beach to the road he looks up at the sky, "Lovely night tonight. Stars are pretty."

"Some of these stars are dead."

"What?" He looks over to the contours of Jean's face, his nose and lips and eyes, as Jean stares up at space. If Eren squints hard enough then he thinks he can see an entire galaxy reflecting in Jean's eye, and hopes that he has his own reflecting too. The look on Jean's face is breathtaking, it's a mixture of awe and inquisition, and perhaps a touch of remorse. 

Has Jean always looked this beautiful on the outside? 

"Some stars are so far away that it takes their light millions of years to reach earth, so by time we see the light the star is dead. Some of these stars aren't even stars anymore. They're just illusions. And the worse part is that you can't tell what's real and what's not..."

His voice is barely a whisper now, and Eren thinks that although this subject is melancholic, it's also incredibly romantic, as all sadness and melancholy themes are. But they're on a beach, and they're under the illusion of a star night, and they both have galaxies in their eyes. If he wanted to he could reach out and grab Jean's hand, right there under the eyes of the universe, and tell him what's real, tell him he's real. He could kiss him, perhaps. 

He doesn't. Instead he walks Jean to the end of the beach and goes home.

 

 

* * *

 

 

The Jean Eren remembers from high school was cocky, brash, rude and full of a bravado that was clearly bullshit. He tried too hard always, and pitched a fit when he didn't get his way.  

This new Jean is a puzzle that continues to change shape and tends to take 180 degree turns that leave skid marks on the ground and grass stains on Eren's knees. 

"Come have a drink with me?"

"Now?" Jean says as he rolls up his yoga matt.

"Yes, now. _Carpe Diem_ and all that jazz _._ "

Jean expression is a little perplexed and wary, looking down at himself, "I'm not really dressed for drinks."

Eren thinks that Jean could wear a potato sack and still make it look like high fashion. _Paper bag_. "Nah, you look fine."

"I'm not taking fashion advice from someone who wore _track pants_ to their graduation ceremony," Jean hisses.

"We can just go back to mine if you're really that worried about what you're wearing. Annie left one of her expensive champagnes in my fridge from new years, and i haven't had anyone to drink it with."

Armin doesn't drink. Bert and Reiner don't like anything that's not homemade and Mikasa is a depressingly emotional drunk. Connie and Sasha think champagne is for pussies and Annie... He doesn't think Annie would willingly agree to spend an afternoon with him, even with the promise of expensive beverages (which are hers anyway). 

Jean bites his lip, "Um, we're just going round to have drinks right?" 

Eren nods, knowing what's implied and hoping he looks like he's not trying to get laid. It wouldn't do any good if Eren gave off a _Jeffery Dahmer vibe_. "Of course, i wasn't- wouldn't think of doing anything else. And i can even call a cab for you to go home, or you can sleep on the pull out couch. I'd have to move it in off the patio first."

Dubiously Jean agrees, but not without acting like it's a self sacrificing event that he now has to endure. He's smiling, and if Eren didn't know any better then he'd say that Jean's a little excited. Nervous, obviously, but excited too. Not to Eren's extent though. 

The walk to Eren's house is short. He doesn't live far from the beach, a three minute walk, one if you run, and Eren stops off at a corner store to buy some food, "I've run out of snacks to eat."

He make's his way up to the apartment and unlocks his door, almost tripping up on the corner of the table when he puts the food there. At least his apartment is clean, has been for some time now in case Jean was to randomly come over (wishful thinking). 

He tell's Jean to sit out on the patio, on the folded out fold out couch (Eren sometimes sleeps outside, because why not) and he grabs the wine from the fridge and two glasses. Outside, Jean is sitting awkwardly, rubbing at his wrists. He snorts when he see's what Eren's holding. 

"You're seriously going to drink a 1940's  _Bangladesh_ out of coffee mugs?"

Eren shrugs, not recognising the problem, "They're clean."

Jean snorts in his uptight snobby way, but it doesn't aggravate Eren like it used to, it just makes him laugh as the skinny blonde takes the mug with a pinched face. "Thank god the champagne is decent."

"Anything for you, princess."

"You have _nothing_ _for me_ , peasant."

"Um, i have this kick ass bed." And my dick. Let's have sex. 

Jean rolls his eyes. It takes a little while for the conversation to start turning into a conversation, but two mugs in and Jean's explaining to him his new idea for a book (something involving a man turning into a woman to make this woman fall in love with the idea of him, or something kinky), and starts ranting about how he's thinking of going overseas for a while. "Where would you go?"

"I don't know. Somewhere remote. I have a friend who i write to in the Himalayas, said he wants me to come and visit, say's he has a story for me to write."

"I can't imagine you thinking of going to Nepal."

"I can't imagine you thinking."

Eren grabs him by the wrists and pins him down to the bed, "Oi!", he smiles, "I'll have you know that i'm an intellectual." Jean wiggles underneath him, digging his heels into Eren's back as hard as he can to make him uncomfortable. When Eren brushes his sides the man underneath him bursts into a fit of laughter, "Holy shit, you're ticklish. I'll have to tell Berotolt."

Golden eyes look at him with an expression of amusement and Jean gasps between laughs, "W-Why- ahh, why would you te-ell Bert- Bertol- Bertie?"

"Because," Eren get's low into Jean's face, so close that he can feel the warm force of Jean's breaths as he clams, and Eren places his elbows on either side of his head, resting his body lightly on the smaller. "He want's to fuck you." Jean's eyes widen. "And so do i."

Jean licks his lips, an act so sinister it has Eren grinding him into the bed and capturing those lips as his. The kiss is hungry and loud, tasting like bittersweet grapes and metal. Their tongues perform a duet of prodding and caressing, playing softly with the piercing between them to the music of their lust. Eren shifts, looming over Jean further and grazing the side of his impossibly smooth neck, tucking a hand under the small of his back when Jean's body arches up beautifully into his with a whine. " _Ah!_ "

Cock leaping in his pants at the sound, Eren's suddenly _devastated_ the both of them still have clothes on. "Off," he says, or he thinks he does. It's possible that he's just fumbling their clothes off with low keening sounds like a dying animal. If it's unattractive Jean doesn't comment, but he seems more than willing to hand over the reins and let Eren take charge. When the yoga pants go there's mixed feelings. They did look good on but seeing them off is... 

Eren stares for a good thirty seconds in awe. 

Jean's boney, and thin, but it suits him. He looks elegant, with long elegant legs that seem to go on for miles, ending in sleek ankles and perfectly manicured feet, purple nail polish chipped and cracking but incredibly sexy. Hipbones, rib bones, collar bones, cheek bones, elbows, jaw line. Eren doesn't know where to start. And Jean's dick, smallish (Eren's not surprised, he suspects it's a side effect from living in skinny jeans) but leaking and throbbing in his hand...

" _Fuck_..."

In retrospect, Eren wishes he had taken his time to explore all the angles of Jean physically, but he was too frantic to think about anything _other_ than sex at that moment, and what it would feel like to have sex everyday for the rest of his life _with Jean_. He could commit to that, he'd be honoured. He slicks a finger up with lube (conveniently smudged between two couch pillows), as fast as he can and circles Jean's hole. He swallows Jean's gasp as Jean swallows his fingers. "Eren- Oh my g- oh!"

He inserts another finger, thrusting them in and out of Jean messily, curling them and quirking them to elicit the most sexually addictive noises Eren's ever heard. Seriously, where can he get a mix tape? When he replaces his fingers for his penis he slots into Jean with a wet slap, fitting together so perfectly it's a wonder how they ever functioned apart. 

Fuck. God, how- what- Eren is speechless. His mind is blank, purely focusing on the tight, wet heat surrounding his cock, and boy is it _tight_ , and _hot_ , and _so fucking wet_. Time seems to stop, or perhaps it's them, caught in this moment forever. Eren thinks he totally could commit to this. He thinks that despite Jean's obvious personality flaws (Eren loves them), the boy was made for sex. Look at him, head thrown back, lips parted, gasping, twisting, whining all for Eren. 

When he starts to move, slowly then abruptly rapid, he feels nails cultivate his back and trail up to his neck then into his hair, one pinching his shoulder. "Oh fuck... Oh fuck baby you feel so fucking good- fuck!"

" _Erennnnnah, ah, ah!_ "

"So fucking tight baby, so wet. Baby you're so so wet for me, just for me, only me baby, only me. I- _jesus_ \- I'm gonna come. It's too much, you're incredible baby and _god you're wet_!"

Suddenly, Jean's legs are up over his shoulders and Eren's seeing how far they will go if he pushes down on Jean's boney hips and leans forward. Jean does yoga, Jean can do the splits, Jean is so fucking bendy it's hard to believe, and Eren want's to twist him every which way to see how far he will go. He want's to press Jean against every surface of this house and distort him into all sorts of angles, see his arch and bow and twist with high pitched whimpers and shrieks. 

How is someone this flexible. Briefly Eren thinks, although he'd rather focus on the strikingly perfect ass in his hands, of Reiner, and how eager he was to get Jean into bed, how he would talk about him as if he were some pinnacle of sex.  Eren totally, totally see's where he's coming from now (he saw it a while ago). 

"Eren, Eren, Eren, oh!"

Jean comes when Eren does, give or take a few seconds in the hazy light on the sliding door. Panting and sweaty and gross, the high from the anticipation, excitement and hunger at getting what he wants is mellowing out for Eren, and now all that's left is the need to sleep. The sex was amazing, of course. All the scenario's built up in Eren's head couldn't compare, and he can't bare the though of loosing this. Of loosing the blissed out sensation of having thoroughly fucked with reckless abandon. And that's really what this was, reckless abandon.

It's retrospect _now_ , and Eren's certainly wishing he'd taken his time, because Jean's sitting up and shaking and fumbling around for a shirt on the floor. The one he put's on is Eren's, which would be perfect if Jean didn't look like he was seconds away from a panic attack. Eren reaches out to touch but Jean violently flinches. "Don't!"

Eren retracts his hand slowly, suddenly on high alert and searching for anything that would give him an indication on why Jean's switched moods so steeply. Eren's reeling form the severity of the 180 degree turn. He softly pulls on his boxes, wiping away the fluids of their previous activity with deliberate motions, slowing into an almost statuesque pose when Jean's breathing become too harsh. He counts to ten, "Je-"

"Y-You got a fucking cigarette?" His words are corse and shake, like they've been stuck by a tornado on their way out. Perhaps they were carved from Jeans obvious inner turmoil.

"Oi, F-Fuckface, you got a smoke?"

Jean's eye's are wide and terrified, locked onto Eren with a golden mirage of terror, hysteria and broad self hatred. Eren want's to know what Jean wants so he can give it to him, he'd give Jean anything he wanted if he stopped looking at him like that. He's not sure if Jean is always this way after sex (he hopes not, he can't imagine other people putting up with this), if this is natural for him to fall into a state of hyperventilation so quickly.

"I-I... need a-a s-smoke."

"Jean, baby, take deep breaths."

"Baby..." he laughs self deprecatingly.

"Just relax now and-"

The blonde shakes his head, venomously wiping his face with purple polish hands, hard enough to leave scratch marks. Hard enough to leave blood. Eren snatches his hands in his own, even as Jean frantically screams himself course. He bucks and jerks like a wild animal, even as Eren, to prevent Jean from injuring himself, grabs him by his narrow waist and holds him still in his lap, retained against his chest. He ignore the snarls and curses and pleading, he's dealt with panic attacks before, when Mikasa was made to do public speaking. Hugging worked as a comfort for her.

After a couple of minutes or so everything calms, deathly eerie. Eren can feel Jean's rapid heartbeat, can feel his fleeting breath, can feel Jean's nails digging into his own palms as Eren nudges his fingers. Neither of them move, so tightly wound into each other and tense it's like they've been frozen in stone. Jean shivers and pleads gently, "Please, Eren, let me go."

He doesn't want to, he wants to stay right where he is and hold Jean for the rest of eternity, even if it rains or snows, he wants to stay out here on this fold out couch under the stars. But this isn't up to him, and he releases Jean to sit up.

How did this turn from something so breathtaking to something like this. Jean's perched on the corner of the bed, small, frightened, clutching his elbows for support, it makes Eren feel like some monstrous beast. 

Was Jean acting like this when they were having sex? Was Eren too mindless to notice that Jean wasn't enjoying it at all? No, no Jean would've made him stop, right? He would've... he... "Jean, what's wrong. What did i do? Did i-"

"It's nothing," those two words sound more rehearsed than Eren's ever head them sound before, "I-I'm just... i think the alcohol got to me faster than i expected, i'm sorry." He nervously laughs, putting a hand on his mouth and closing his eyes, almost like he's restraining every thing inside him. His feelings and emotions. Eren doesn't like that. "I'm sorry, i can't-"

"Can't what?" Eren says, desperately confused. 

Jean looks at him for a long time. Eren's being judged, he knows this, he can feel it but the way his arm hairs stand straight. Jean isn't a very trusting person, anyone can tell by the way he's prone to lashing out and attacking before anyone else can do it first. Eren's been punched randomly in the face more times than he can count, for no other reason than Jean wanting to regain control of the situation. But that was in high school, where low self-esteem and insecurity ran high in the hallways.

And Jean was always at the pinnacle of that, always trying way too hard with his piercings and his makeup and his style and his I-don't-give-a-fuck-attitude-but-i-secretly-do-please-don't-hurt-me-because-i-can't-handle-it. 

Eren was the one who didn't give a fuck in high school, he was the one who had aspirations bigger than what people thought of him, which might be why teaches and police alike hated him. In high school, in his later years when he wasn't a shrimpy brat, he joined the rugby team, got invited to parties, became popular, lost his virginity to a girl, lost his virginity to a guy (He thought that both of them were girls, but one turned out to be trans and that was all cool, Eren rolled with it because shit like that doesn't matter if your both into it).

But Eren would give anything to be the one that Jean can trust and believe in. He wants to be the once to reassure Jean when his self esteem goes out the window or if he ever second guesses himself, because god knows Jean's been there for him to bring him down to earth whenever he get's too self absorbed, even if it was through insults and punches. 

If he stays very still, Jean might not run away from him like he wants to, or at least that's what Eren thinks. He doesn't even breath when Jean's eyes suddenly become glossy and his lip trembles. 

"I've had a crush on you since forever, did you know that?"

Eren breathes a gasp, then he doesn't breathe at all. "No."

Jean laughs, again self deprecating and borderline hysteric. It hurts Eren's heart.

"Of course not. How could you. You were too busy making friends and doing Eren stuff. But... I used to watch you when you had rugby practice, i'd stand behind the bleachers like a fucking loser, even when it rained because you guys still practiced in the rain and... And i used to write stories about you. About us. Stories where you would... and i would... and we'd..."

Eren hopes that Jean's imaginative and creative inspiration came from him. It's egotistical, but love rather is. Jean's a modern, romantic, Edgar Allen Poe.

"I knew that none of my story shit would ever happen. And i was okay with that, in fact i had gotten over you, like way fucking over you and your 'death-or-glory' bullshit."

Eren understood. He left high school to conquer the world, but Jean had been too afraid of the world to even question it.

"Until... U-Until you bloody dragged me back into it with words a-and kisses and i fucking thought you _liked me,_ only to go home with you to find that in the morning you didn't even want me. You were too fucking drunk to even..." He clutches his elbows with white knuckles. 

So that's it. Jean remembers their night but Eren doesn't.

"I'd thought that the first time we did it," he continues, "it would be magical and special and i would wake up and feel good but i didn't, i didn't- i felt sick and gross and you didn't even-" 

Eren gets it now. He wishes he'd gotten it sooner. Jean had been in love with him, had anticipated their first time together as something special. But when the time came Eren didn't even remember it, he was hungover and cruel and kicked Jean out like a stray. Where Jean, recklessly emotional Jean, who's a writer, who can inscribe the world onto paper using words from his soul, had envisioned it to be spectacular and meaningful. What was meant to be deep was ruined. 

It was ruined because Eren was drunk.

And now he's most likely lost all possible trust Jean could have in him. 

"I should leave." Jean's eyes are dark and bloodshot, with smudged clouds of mascara around his eyes. "I'm tired and i need to ring someone so i don't fucking do anything stupid when i get home because i fucking... because i fucking feel like shit right now. God, i'm in my own fucking novel."

Eren's confused, "I-Isn't that what you wanted?"

"No. The real world is what i want."

He stands.

No, this isn't what Eren wants. Eren has not been obsessing over Jean for the last couple of months (if he's honest for the last ten years that he's known him, since he threw the first punch) for no reason. 

But Eren doesn't know how to redeem himself from this. He's still reeling  from the fact that Jean is, was, in love with him, and that he didn't even notice. Eren is pissed at himself for being such an asshole, remembering the way he treated Jean when he woke from his room. 

"Jean-"

"Don't. Please don't. I know what you think of me, i know that you hate me and all that but-"

"Hate you? Jean," he get's down on one knee to look at Jean's downcast eyes, grabbing his shaking hand, "What the hell makes you think i hate you? That's ridiculous. I've been stalking you for the past four weeks." 

Jean sniffs, "I thought you were rubbing it in."

"I'm an asshole, but i'm not that much of an asshole. Who do you think i am?" He rubs at Jean's hands and moves into the space between his legs. "Baby, i'm so fucking sorry that i just-... but i didn't know. I didn't know that it meant that much to you, and i'm sorry for acting like i did. If i could i would go back and make sure you were never put in a situation where you could be hurt by me."

He kisses Jean's soft hand lightly, "I really fucking love you Jean. And i know this is love. Because... Because whenever i'm around you i feel like holding you, and kissing you. And when i'm not my mind wanders, and it always find's its way to you. I think... I think i've always been in love, that we've always been in love, you just figured it out first."

"You don't mean that."

"It's as true as the stars, baby."

Jean snorts. "Well, that proves it then. The stars are-"

"Dead, i know. But that doesn't mean our love is."

What happens when you put two hopeless romantics together? You get a lot of cheese.  

Jean falls into Eren's arms, or rather, he primly folds himself into them, because he's a ducking pretentious asshole like that. 

Eren invited him over for drinks, and he thought that maybe it would lead to sex, not a confession. But he would take this Jean in a heart beat over sex. 

He kisses the side of his ear and wraps his arms around Jean's slim waist, then lifting him up to lay back against the duvet pillow. Jean tucks himself under Eren's arm and swipes at his tears angrily, "I'm sorry. This is... fucking pathetic. You don't need to deal with this, honestly. I shouldn't be crying like this over your cheesy ass love confession."

"It's fine, and it wasn't that cheesy."

Jean huffs against his shoulder. "It was pretty cheesy. But, i dunno. I kinda liked it."

That's all that matters then.

Eren pulls out the duvet from behind them and covers them to keep out the cold and other nasties.

He looks up at the stars and thinks about how there are fake ones and real ones, and thinks about how life is a series of stars, and that it's hard to know if your admiring something that doesn't exist or if you're just counting every star to be dead.

He distracts himself with Jean's green apple shampoo before his thoughts become too existential and metaphorical. Jean's the writer of smutty romance novels and the one who thinks that stars are dead, Eren's the one who just figured out he's in love with him, and has to show him some stars are still burning. 

And when Eren wakes up, curled around Jean like a shield against the world, he remembers everything. 


End file.
